The International Finance Corporation is changing the way it does business — to the detriment of people and the environment.

For years, the World Bank’s private-sector arm provided loans almost exclusively to companies and projects. Now, the IFC is outsourcing the bulk of its development work to for-profit financial institutions. Between 2010 and 2015, the IFC provided $50 billion to commercial banks, private equity funds and insurance firms. These financial intermediaries then invested the money as they saw fit, with little apparent oversight from the IFC.

The IFC has refused to disclose where most of these funds end up, so Inclusive Development International is following the money to answer this question: How does it impact people on the ground?

The investigation tackled has only a small portion of the IFC’s extensive financial-sector portfolio. Yet the results have been shocking. The IFC is funneling billions of dollars into some of most notorious companies and projects in the world. The problem is systemic, and not limited to just a few cases.

In many instances, these investments have done more than just fail to help the poor. They have actually caused great harm to people and the environment. According to our investigation, IFC intermediaries have financed companies that have forcibly evicted and impoverished hundreds of thousands of people. They have contributed to climate change, ravaged forests, polluted the oceans and rivers, and killed endangered species. Activists who have dared to resist them have been jailed, beaten and even murdered.

The projects come from a range of high-risk sectors, such as energy, agribusiness, mining , transportation and infrastructure. They are located in Africa, Asia and Latin America. The findings include some of the most notorious industrial disasters. Yet until now, the IFC’s involvement was unknown.

Part 1 of the series,“Disaster for Us and the Planet”, examines the contribution of IFC intermediaries to climate change. The report reveals how IFC financial-sector clients have funded dozens of new coal projects since the World Bank announced its moratorium on new coal funding. The second installment, Bankrolling India’s Dirty Dozen, examines IFC’s covert support for India’s most abusive corporations. Part 3 of the investigation, Reckless Development, reveals dozens of harmful projects funded by IFC intermediaries in Southeast Asia. The report profiles the struggle of Karen communities in Myanmar, who after surviving 70 years of civil war and displacement now have to contend with a destructive coal mine indirectly backed by the IFC. The fourth and final part of the series, Unjust Enrichment, exposes how IFC intermediaries have backed some of the most notorious land grabs on the African continent. This report profiles the story of an artisanal mining community in Northern Guinea that was forcibly evicted and impoverished by one of the world’s largest mining companies in order to expand a goldmine that was financed in part by one of the IFC’s African intermediary banks.

IDI has also published a project database, which details all of the harmful investments that we’ve linked to IFC intermediaries. This will be updated periodically with new findings.

The IFC must stop investing in irresponsible financial institutions that fund destructive projects. And it must take urgent action to bring its financial sector investments into line with the World Bank Group’s sustainable development mandate and the IFC Performance Standards. In order to achieve this, we urge the IFC’s Board of Directors to adopt the following fundamental reforms:

Require all financial sector clients, as a condition of IFC’s investment, to adopt a human rights policy that is aligned with the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.

Publicly disclose all higher risk financial intermediary sub-clients and their projects, sufficiently prior to appraisal to allow public comment.

Publicly disclose how the IFC monitors and tracks development impact from intermediary investments and ensures traceability for all FI investments that are directed to a specific purpose. This includes disclosure of draft and final monitoring, evaluation and tracking reports.

Ensure remediation of harmful impacts in a prospective FI client’s existing portfolio to ensure compliance with the applicable requirements before IFC commitment or disbursement.

Pro-actively ensure that affected communities have access to an effective remedy to prevent and redress harms, including by ensuring clients/sub-clients inform communities from early stages about the availability of the CAO.

Scale down the financial sector portfolio to a level commensurate with IFC’s capacity to ensure that sub-investments comply with the Performance Standards.

Part 1 of the Outsourcing Development investigation examines the contribution of IFC intermediaries to climate change and the destruction of forests. The report, “Disaster for Us and the Planet”: How the IFC is Funding a Coal Boom, reveals how IFC financial-sector clients have funded dozens of new coal projects since the World Bank announced its moratorium on new coal funding. The report highlights the human toll that these projects are having on local communities, in addition to their contribution to global climate change.

Part 2 of the Outsourcing Development investigation looks at the impacts of IFC financial intermediary lending in India. The report, Bankrolling India’s Dirty Dozen, examines the environmental and social practices of 12 of India’s largest and most reckless companies, which have received considerable financing from IFC intermediaries. Altogether IDI identified 68 projects or companies financed by six Indian financial intermediaries of IFC whose practices appear to fall well short of its Performance Standards, and in some cases entail extremely serious violations.

Part 3 of Outsourcing Development follows the IFC money trail into the black hole of intermediated lending in Southeast Asia. The report reveals how IFC intermediaries have funded some of the region’s most destructive projects, contravening the Performance Standards, the institution’s social and environmental guidelines. These projects include mega-hydropower dams in Vietnam and Cambodia, dirty coal-fired power plants and mines in the Philippines, Vietnam and Myanmar, and massive agro-industrial land grabs in Cambodia and Laos.

Part 4 of Outsourcing Development exposes how the IFC has enabled and profited from land grabbing on the African continent through financial intermediary investments. IDI’s investigation found 11 projects backed by IFC intermediaries that have transferred approximately 700,000 hectares of land to foreign investors. The projects include agribusiness concessions in the Gambella region of Ethiopia that were cleared of their indigenous inhabitants during a massive forcible population transfer campaign in the area; oil palm plantations in Gabon that have destroyed 19,000 hectares of rainforest and infringed on the customary land rights of local communities; and a gold mine in Guinea that led to the violent forced eviction of 380 families.

Representatives of more than 700 Cambodian families who were violently displaced to make way for a sugar plantation have filed a formal complaint against Bonsucro, the sugar industry’s sustainability certification body, for breaches of the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises.

(March 8, 2019 - Conakry) – Residents of 13 villages in western Guinea have filed a formal complaint against the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the World Bank’s private-sector arm, for funding the expansion of a harmful bauxite mine.

People can soon start filing grievances with AIIB projects, but the new policy still falls short. Inclusive Development International's Natalie Bugalski and partners review AIIB's new Complaints Handling Mechanism in this China Dialogue story by Lili Pike.

A criminal complaint has been lodged at the Court of First Instance of Siguiri, Guinea by ten victims of human abuses committed by Guinean defense and security forces during a crackdown on demonstrations against the local subsidiary of mining giant